Designed to Give Information About Language Abilities in Individuals Considered "Impossible" to Assess

Enid G. Wolf-Schein Ed.D.

As its name suggests, the Wolf Inventory of Psycholinguistic Progress (WIPP) assesses and provides information about a broad range of communication information with which to determine speech and language progress in individuals who have a variety of disabilities. WIPP is particularly useful for the assessment of those clients who are difficult or "impossible" to assess. Most WIPP schedules do not require the client's cooperation; hence, their condition at any given time will not interfere with obtaining data from those schedules. For schedules that do involve direct interaction with the clients being assessed, WIPP offers alternative means of gathering similar data about them.

WIPP's principal purposes are to provide a broad overview of psycholinguistic development, and to establish landmarks from which to measure psycholinguistic progress. The areas surveyed include not only observable behaviors, but also features of the individual's physique and environment. By casting all of this information into a single inventory, WIPP aids the assessor by assuring that significant factors are not overlooked. Secondly, by bringing all of these data into a single focus, WIPP strives to sho1ten the lag between diagnosis (or assessment) and treatment (or intervention). WIPP exemplifies an approach to language delayed and impaired persons of all ages that endeavors to incorporate all critical information into a comprehensive treatment program.